


A Time to Every Purpose

by glorious_spoon



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Humor, M/M, Meddling, Misunderstandings, POV Outsider, POV Outsider on Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, POV Sheriff Stilinski
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-09 22:01:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15277083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: Sheriff Stilinski hears a crash from Stiles's room in the middle of the night and walks in on something he really would rather not have seen. But it's totally not what it looks like. At all.Or is it?





	A Time to Every Purpose

He doesn’t usually make a habit of opening Stiles’s door without knocking these days, but when he’s woken up an hour before dawn by a rattling crash and a pained-sounding yelp from his son’s room, Noah is halfway down the hall, service pistol in hand, before his brain has even fully emerges from the fog of sleep. He shoulders the door open, swings his gun up, and then stops, mind going abruptly blank at the sight that greets him.

There’s no intruder. Or, rather, there _is_ , but not one that Noah can shoot at, more’s the pity. Derek Hale is on the floor in the middle of the room, Stiles sprawled on top of him. They’re both stark naked and smeared in what looks like body paint. A thick, metallic odor permeates the air.

Noah opens his mouth, shuts it again, and lowers the gun.

“You have got to be kidding me,” he says out loud, after a long, stunned silence, and both their heads pop up. Stiles yelps again, rolls off of Hale, and draws both his knees up to shield his groin. Hale sits up too, but he doesn’t seem that concerned by the fact that he’s naked. Unfortunately.

“Um,” Stiles says at length, and makes a wincing kind of smile in Noah’s direction. “Would you believe me if I told you that there is a really good explanation for this and it's totally not what it looks like?”

“I would really, really like to,” Noah says, eyeing the pair of them. Stiles is beet-red all the way up to the roots of his hair. Hale, on the other hand, looks remarkably composed considering that he’s sprawled on the floor wearing nothing but smeared body paint. Possibly even amused, which is an expression Noah hadn’t even realized his face could make. “But no. I wouldn’t.”

“Dad—”

“Would you just—” he sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose, thinking wistfully of the bottle of whiskey in his desk. “Put some clothes on and meet me downstairs.”

“ _Dad,_ ” Stiles says again, and surprisingly enough it’s Hale who interjects.

“Yessir.” And then, to Stiles, “You’re in enough trouble already. Don’t make it worse.”

“This is _your_ fault,” Stiles says mulishly. “And I’m eighteen.”

“Hence the reason I’m not arresting your boyfriend on the spot,” Noah says, thumbing the safety back on the gun. “Put your pants on, and meet me downstairs.”

“He’s not my—” Stiles starts, but Noah is already out of the room and he doesn’t hear the end of the sentence. He can hear the pair of them arguing in furious whispers as he descends the staircase, but he tunes it out. Some things man was not meant to know. What his son’s boyfriend looks like naked is probably one of those things, actually, but unfortunately, the ship has sailed on that one.

* * *

He locks the gun in his bedside table, considers starting a pot of coffee, and then finally gives up and pours a generous measure of whiskey into a juice glass and sits down at the kitchen table. He’s still contemplating it when the two of them clatter down the stairs, dressed and haphazardly cleaned up. There’s still a smear of paint running from the corner of Stiles’s jaw across his Adams apple and disappearing beneath the collar of his t-shirt. Something metallic in it catches the light and glitters.

“So,” he says, clearing his throat.

“Sit,” Noah says, indicating the other two chairs. Hale sits down immediately, which would be gratifying if it weren’t for the look of bland innocence on his face that Noah doesn’t buy for a second. Stiles scowls, shifts on his feet, then finally drops into a chair like a sack of flour. He opens his mouth, glances at Hale, then shuts it again, hunching defensively in on himself.

Noah takes a sip of his whiskey, eyeing the two of them.

“So,” he says finally, when he’s deemed the silence long and pointed enough. “How long has this been going on?”

“Oh, by ‘this’ do you mean a werewolf with boundary issues sneaking in my window at 3 AM to terrorize me into performing rituals involving gratuitous nudity and non-consensual body art?” Stiles snaps. He’s hunched over the table, the heel of one hand pressed against his forehead, a little like he has a headache and a lot like he’s hoping he’ll just disappear if he concentrates hard enough. “I really wish I could say this is the first time it’s ever happened, but, uh. A while.”

“Non-consensual body art?” Noah repeats, raising his eyebrows. He’s starting to get the feeling that he’s already losing his grip on this conversation.

Hale looks put out. “I asked first.”

“If by ‘asked’ you mean ‘loomed over me in the middle of the night with a knife and a jar of gross-smelling paint’, sure.”

“You say that like you expect me to believe you’re afraid of me.”

“I could be!” Stiles lifts his head and jabs a finger in Hale’s general direction. “Because you’re legitimately terrifying! With the eyebrows and the growling and the—”

“You’re not afraid of me,” Hale says, perfectly confident. “You haven’t been in a long time.”

Stiles deflates a little. “Okay, yeah, no, not really, but I have really shitty self-preservation instincts, ask anybody.”

“I don’t need to _ask_ anybody, I see it for myself all the—”

“Boys,” Noah interrupts finally. They both turn to look at him like they’ve forgotten he’s even in the room. Good grief. It’s actually worse than he thought. They have no idea.

He walked in on the two of them doing the equivalent of naked Twister, covered in body paint, and they still have no fucking idea. God help him, how is this oblivious dumbass his child? At least Hale was literally raised by wolves. Stiles has no excuse.

This is all probably somehow Noah’s fault.

“Yeah, Dad?” Stiles asks. He’s going for guileless, and, as usual, misses it by a mile.

“Not dating, then.”

“Nope.”

“You understand how I might have gotten that impression, though.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says, making a face. “There was kind of a _lot_ of nudity. And squirming. And awkward bone— you know what, I’m going to shut up now.”

“Please do,” Noah says weakly. On the other side of the table, Hale’s eyebrows are drawn down in a way that would be a lot more intimidating if it weren’t for the fact that he’s clearly trying not to laugh his ass off.

Apparently, Derek Hale has a sense of humor. Will wonders never cease.

“We’re really not together,” Stiles adds, somewhat more subdued. “Derek doesn’t even like dudes. It was just a spell, I promise. I’d— I would tell you. If something was going on.”

“I know you would,” Noah says, because it’s true, but it’s actually Hale’s face he’s looking at right now. The way his mouth opens, then snaps shut, like he’d been about to argue something before he thought better of it. And, well, it’s five in the morning and Noah has never claimed to be a saint, so he gives Hale a pleasant look and says, “But at least one of those things was wrong. Wasn’t it?”

Hale glances up at him. He’s not laughing now. For a moment, his expression is tense, and then he sighs, something acquiescent in him, and says, “It really was just a spell.”

Stiles may be oblivious, but he’s far from stupid. Noah watches his expression go sharp and suspicious, and then he peers at Hale. “It was just a spell, okay, what about the rest of it?”

Hale scowls. “We’re not dating. I’m pretty sure you would have noticed if we were.”

“I can be kind of dense about these things,” Stiles says easily, but he’s scented blood now, Noah can see it in his face. He’d feel bad for Hale, but honestly the guy probably has it coming. “What if I wanted us to be dating? I mean, I don’t do naked body paint rituals with just anybody.”

Hale glances at Noah, a flush rising in his cheeks, and yeah, that’s probably his cue to leave. He pushes his chair out and stands. “Well, it sounds like you two have a lot to talk about. I’m going back to bed. And Mr. Hale? Next time you stop over to see Stiles, do me a favor and use the goddamn front door, will you?”

Before either of them can answer, he plucks his whiskey off of the table and takes himself out of the room.

He manages, just barely, to make it to the top of the stairs before he starts laughing.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know, this is a completely silly little scene that popped into my head last night.
> 
> Come say hi on [Tumblr](http://glorious-spoon.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
